Monday (7-12) & Tuesday (7-13)
POOL CLIMBING & ROCKY ARRIVAL
Click on thumbnails for larger images.

 
     
First thing in the morning we drove back to Ouray to climb at an area called the Pool Wall (because it is across the street from the hot spring pool in Ouray). This is a newly developed area with many, many established sport climbs.
 
This climb is in an area of the Pool Wall called the Alcove. It was shaded when Aaron led the climb but when Katie climbed it the sun was beginning to creep in over the surrounding trees.
 
This route was an easy 5.8 sport climb also in the Alcove. Months of climbing could be spent at Pool Wall without repeating a route. Someday we would like to go back to Ouray and spend a couple weeks hiking and climbing in the surrounding mountains.
 
After climbing all morning we left Ouray and headed northwest through Grand Junction. The temperature reached 103 as we drove through arid western CO.
 
We saw this Mesa near Grand Junction as we headed towards Rifle, CO. We camped in Rifle Mountain Park Monday night. The next morning we drove through the park and watched climbers ascending the limestone walls of the Canyon. Rifle is a well known climbing area with very difficult sport climbs.
     
 
In the afternoon we reached our destination of the day, Rocky Mountain National Park. We camped in the Timber Creek Campground on the western side of RMNP. This picture was taken looking to the west near the campground.  
 
After setting up our tent and eating some dinner we drove further east into the park on Trail Ridge Road, which is the highest paved road in the United States. The peak to the left in this picture is Longs Peak. It is the highest mountain in the park.
 
On the way back to our campground we saw many elk grazing at dusk.
 
This picture was taken of an elk standing alongside the road. Aaron held the camera out the window, zoomed and pressed the button as we drove by this elk, hence the blurring. Kind of funny the way the picture ending up coming out though.